Had the privilege of doing several deployments to the Med in the ‘80s based at NAS Sigonella. Etna was always active and visible for miles from the air. The worlds best natural beacon. Occasional visits to Catania for food and drink seemed to put one directly under the thing. It was amazing. While it occasionally acted up we never experienced anything like this one...
Apparently it's been active like this for at least 30K years, and that strait has seen a lot of traffic in that span of time, probably how the earlier mariners found the strait, also, how they found out Sicily was an island when they decided to sail around the erupting volcano. :^)